Programming

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Welcome to the main community in programming.dev! Feel free to post anything relating to programming here!

Cross posting is strongly encouraged in the instance. If you feel your post or another person's post makes sense in another community cross post into it.

Hope you enjoy the instance!

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Follow the programming.dev instance rules
Keep content related to programming in some way
If you're posting long videos try to add in some form of tldr for those who don't want to watch videos

Wormhole

Follow the wormhole through a path of communities [email protected]

founded 2 years ago

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Ategon

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An open source Peer-to-peer serverless decentralized social media protocol built on IPFS (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 weeks ago by [email protected] to c/programming

52 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Plebbit is pure peer-to-peer social media protocol, it has no central servers, no global admins, and no way shut down communities-meaning true censorship resistance.

Unlike federated platforms, like lemmy and Mastedon, there are no instances or servers to rely on

this project was created due to wanting to give control of communication and data back to the people.

Plebbit only hosts text. Images from google and other sites can be linked/embedded in posts. This fixes the issue of hosting any nefarious content.

ENS domain are used to name communities.

Plebbit currently offers different UIs. Old reddit UI and new reddit, 4chan, and have a Blog. Plebbit intend to have an app, internet archive, wiki and twitter and Lemmy UI . Choice is important. The backend/communities are shared across clients.

anyone can contribute, build their own client, and shape the ecosystem

Important Links :

Home

https://plebbit.com/home

App

https://plebbit.com/home#cb2a9c90-6f09-44b2-be03-75f543f9f5aa

FAQ

https://github.com/plebbit/whitepaper/blob/master/FAQ.md

Whitepapers

https://github.com/plebbit/whitepaper

https://github.com/plebbit/whitepaper/discussions/2

Github

https://github.com/plebbit

https://github.com/plebbit/plebbit-react

https://github.com/plebbit/plebbit-react/releases

https://github.com/plebbit/seedit

https://github.com/plebbit/seedit/releases

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 weeks ago (15 children)

If there's no central server then where is all the data stored?. With Lemmy I know the instance creator has to host it all on his own server.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 weeks ago (13 children)

Great question! Unlike Lemmy, which relies on federation with dedicated servers, Plebbit is fully peer-to-peer (P2P) and does not have a central server or even instances. Instead, storage happens via a combination of IPFS and users seeding data. Here’s how it works:

Where Is Plebbit's Data Stored?

Subplebbit Owners Host the Data (Like Torrent Seeders)
- Each subplebbit owner runs a Plebbit node that stores and republishes their own community's data.
- Their device (or a server, if they choose) must be online 24/7 to ensure the subplebbit remains accessible.
- If a subplebbit owner goes offline, their community disappears unless others seed it—very similar to how torrents work.
Users Act as Temporary Seeders
- Any user who visits a subplebbit automatically stores and seeds the content they read.
- This means active users help distribute content, like in BitTorrent.
- If a user closes their app and no one else is seeding the content, it becomes unavailable until the owner comes back online.
IPFS for Content Addressing
- Posts and comments are stored in IPFS, which ensures that popular content remains available longer.
- Unlike a blockchain, there is no permanent historical ledger—if no one is seeding, the data is gone.
- Each post has a content address (CID), meaning that as long as someone has the data, it can be re-fetched.
PubSub for Live Updates
- Plebbit uses peer-to-peer pubsub (publish-subscribe messaging) to broadcast new content between nodes in real-time.
- This helps users see new posts without needing a central server to pull updates from.

What Happens If Everyone Goes Offline?

If no one's online to seed a subplebbit, it's as if it never existed.
This is a trade-off for infinite scalability—it removes the need for central databases but relies on community participation.
Think of it like a dead torrent—no seeders, no content.

Comparison With Lemmy

Feature	Lemmy	Plebbit
Hosting Model	Federated servers (instances)	Fully P2P (no servers)
Who Stores Data?	Instance owners (like Reddit mods running a server)	Subplebbit owners & users (like torrents)
If Owner Goes Offline?	Instance still exists; data stays up	The community disappears unless users seed it
Historical Content Availability	Instances keep all posts forever	Older data may disappear if not seeded
Scalability	Limited by instance storage & bandwidth	Infinite, as long as people seed

Bottom Line: No Servers, Just Users

With Lemmy: The instance owner has to host everything themselves like a mini-Reddit admin.
With Plebbit: The subplebbit owner AND users seed the content—no one has to host a centralized database.
If something is popular, it stays alive.
If something isn't seeded, it disappears, just like torrents.

It’s a radical trade-off for decentralization and censorship resistance, but if no one cares about a community, the content naturally dies off. No server, no mods deleting you from a database—just pure P2P.